Tuesday, 11 November 2014

Am I a bad feminist?

I should preface what I’m about to
say with the fact that I do consider myself a feminist. Like total
badass and all-round babe Caitlin Moran, I believe that all women
simply have to be feminists. It’s a bit strange not to want
equal rights for yourself and your gender.

I am also aware,
though, that I’m not quite up to standard as a feminist. I share
this feeling, which is perhaps becoming a prevailing mood among some
women, with Roxane Gay, author of the New York Times bestselling Bad Feminist: Essays. This collection
offers a humorous insight into the mind of a woman who believes in
the fundamental aims of feminism but says ‘I read Vogue, and I’m
not doing it ironically’. She alludes in her title to the high
standards some feminists set for themselves and other women when it
comes to the ways a good feminist
shouldbehave,
think and act. It’s as if she read my mind.

Recent events
have brought my lack of dedication to the cause into stark focus. A
while ago, over dinner with friends, a tipsy debate (read: slanging
match) about feminism erupted. After occasionally interjecting and
positing counter arguments to both sides, I eventually sat back and
watched it unfold. As the Sauvignon Blanc flowed, everyone got
angrier, talked over each other, took the argument round in a circle
and generally spoiled the evening. The boys demanded statistics as
proof of the daily episodes of sexism the girls encountered. The
girls were annoyed that the boys were de-valuing their argument by
saying they’d gone all ‘shrill’. The boys felt personally
attacked because the girls hadn’t specified that they didn’t
include them in the ‘men’ category. The girls said they were sick
of being polite about issues surrounding sexism and misogyny, and
they no longer cared if they came across as rude.

I kept schtum for
an easy life, because I wanted to drink my wine and enjoy my meal and
because I didn’t think the argument was worth having if it was just
going to leave a lingering bad atmosphere. In the end nothing was
resolved, everyone was just quite cross. However, when women are
still getting such a raw deal, should I be a bit more shouty about
it? Was I wrong to clam up? Increasingly I feel as though I'm not a
good enough feminist because I don't fight or shout as loud as I
could.

These days, the
ways in which one can be a bad feminist are endless. I felt a bit
sorry for Miley Cyrus when she went off on her dental-floss-leotard
bender, provoking the response ‘you only think that because she’s
a woman! She’s empowered!’ from one po-faced acquaintance. My
interest in what one might call ‘girly’ pursuits is frowned upon
by some who think I’ve simply been brainwashed by the patriarchal
media. I buy lifestyle magazines and I enjoy reading them. I like
frivolous things like makeup, clothes and jewellery. I paint my
nails, I pluck my eyebrows and occasionally I wear high heels. What
is important is that it is my choice
and my right to enjoy these things.

Being
proscriptive is not ok, whether you’re telling me I have to look
beautiful because it’s my role as a woman to be ornamental or
whether you’re telling me I can’t possibly be a good feminist if
I do wear makeup or enjoy fashion. I direct you to a fabulous article by beauty writer Sali Hughes about
her, and womankind’s, right to express herself through makeup and
how this doesn’t make her a blubbering moron who can’t also talk
about the serious stuff. Being interested in YSL Faux Cils mascara
and BBC News 24 are not mutually exclusive. See also this
fantastic bit of writing by Hadley Freeman about why reading fashion
magazines doesn’t make you stupid. Just to throw in another casual
bit of gender stereotyping, do we consider men incapable of coherent
thought just because they blather on about sport? It is so unfair to
judge someone’s entire character and moral code based on one aspect
of their life, man or woman.

All of my ‘girly’
interests aside, the main reason I fear I’m not a good feminist is
because I don’t fight hard enough for the cause. I grew up in a
household where I don't think I even heard the word 'feminism' before
my teenage years. There were no gender roles to speak of. Both
parents cooked, both parents worked (in the same profession), both
did the laundry. I’m one of two daughters and as kids we
practically lived outside, climbing trees, catching frogs and getting
muddy in our wellies. We had barbies too, but there were no
restrictions on what we wanted to do, or how we wanted to dress or
play. We had both a mini doctor’s kit and a mini mechanic kit. Home
videos are testament to the fact that we sometimes mixed up their
contents, treating all manner of illnesses with a screwdriver and a
chisel. I grew up unaware that there was a problem or that sexism
even existed. I wonder if this has made me complacent.

As an
adult- I use that term loosely- I've encountered the kind of misogyny
and sexism which sees women jeered at on the streets or patronised
for 'having an opinion'. The kind where the only way to get a man to
leave you alone is to say your boyfriend is on his way, or the kind
where you occasionally feel scared walking home alone. Aside from
such daily instances, perhaps it has hindered my life in unknown
ways: the job application tossed in the bin on the basis of gender. I
seem to have accepted all of this and live my life accordingly,
planning around it.

Is apathy the reason why the cause of
feminism isn't advancing faster? Our grandparents’ views about
gender roles seem extreme when compared even to those of our parents,
so surely the trend will continue and things will continue to get
better? Now I'm not so sure. Young women's apathy might stall things
and even allow for regression.

There are plenty
of examples of this regression. In recent years the internet, and
social media in particular, has become a place where large numbers of
vile threats are made against women on a daily basis. The experience
of Caroline Criado-Perez is one high profile example. She was
threatened with rape and murder, up to fifty times per hour on
Twitter for a period in July, as a result of her campaign to have
women depicted on banknotes. The
Guardian recently reported that
there had been a 21% increase in reported sex offences on trains in
the year 2013-14, a depressing statistic. It shouldn’t be ignored
that many of the perpetrators of this abuse and misogyny, both online
and off, are young men. Young men who don’t seem to be following
any kind of trend to do with the fading away of sexism over time.
Perhaps the problem isn't going away, perhaps it's actually slowly
getting more ingrained, and perhaps my inaction means that I’m part
of the problem.

A lot of people
like to have a go at feminists, saying they nit-pick, they suck the
joy out of things, they’re killjoys. This nit-picking is actually
simply pointing out the insidious nature of sexism, and how although
we might sometimes feel like we, as women, have it pretty good, there
is still a long way to go. The work of the Everyday Sexism Project
provides the shock we need to remind us how unfairly women are
treated. This
infuriating video is an uncomfortable watch, but an accurate
representation of the harassment many women experience when walking
down the street alone. Just this week, the Global Gender Gap Report
conducted by the World Economic Forum placed the UK in 26th
place on a list of the most gender equal countries in the world,
falling from 18th
place last year. This comes in the wake of average wages for women in
the workplace falling by £2,700 since 2013.

I don’t think
that my choice to buy makeup, magazines or beautiful shoes makes me a
bad feminist. Failing to acknowledge the scale of the problems women
still face and deciding that it was easier to stay the hell out of
discussions about feminism definitely did make me a bad feminist. I
am going to try harder to speak up when I hear or see an example of
misogyny or sexism. Although things are moving in the right
direction, I’ve realised that we can only start being complacent
once we have reached the point of total equality. We aren’t there
yet.

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